Awfully Good: Faust

Faust: Love of the Damned (2000)

Director: Brian YuznaStars: Andrew Divoff, Jeffrey Combs, Mark Frost

Is there a plot?

Once upon a time, SPAWN had sex with THE CROW. Nine months later, FAUST was born.

What's the damage?

I first became aware of FAUST: LOVE OF THE DAMNED after seeing a clip of a woman who, when touched by a powerful demon, began to see her chest and rear end grow exponentially until soon, the poor girl was literally just a gooey pile of tits and ass. The film was then added to my Qwikster Netflix queue.

(You may now watch this scene in the Best Parts section below. Go ahead. I’ll wait.)

A screenshot from JOBLO'S BASEMENT: THE MOVIE.

Based on a graphic novel of the same name, FAUST has more to do with superhero myths than it does with the original Faustian legends penned by Marlowe or Goethe. At least I don't remember the 18th century German writer having his main character behead people with Wolverine claws while rocking out to Linkin Park. Faust in this movie is pretty much an even worse version of SPAWN (if that’s humanly possible) with a little bit of THE CROW's emo-ness thrown in for bad measure. He spouts nonsensical one-liners (see Best Lines section below), acts like a weirdo (why is he always licking men?), and seems to be constantly followed around by terrible Christian metalcore music. Not to mention our bedeviled hero looks like a bad Buffy villain sporting adamantium claws.

In a flagrant violation of Street Fighter canon, Vega offs both Balrog and Chun Li.

Director Brian Yuzna, best known for his RE-ANIMATOR sequels and SOCIETY, the flick with the world's biggest body horror orgy at the end, brings some of his same sensibilities to this adaptation. Parts of FAUST definitely go overboard for shock value (there's no shortage of gore or nudity) and, while not really approaching anything realistic, the special effects by Screaming Mad George (whose work we recently encountered in CURSE II: THE BITE), are still pretty cool to watch. However, the decidedly cheesy script falls in to the hands of some truly questionable acting. On the good side are genre vets like Re-Animator Jeffrey Combs as a hardcore cop named Hound Dog, as well as the WISHMASTER himself Andrew Divoff, who plays Mephistopholes…I mean, "M," with a certain amount of cool, overacting finesse that I can get onboard with. (His albino haircut, not so much.) And then there's Mark Frost as the title character, and Isabel Brook as his therapist/sex partner. Frost is high up there on the list of "Actors I Never Want to See Attempt Acting Again," and his romance with the equally bad Brooks turns the love story subplot in to a train wreck even Bruce Willis couldn't survive.

"I'll take Horrible Pet Names for $300, Alex."

It's almost fitting considering FAUST has look and talent of a high(er) budget porn movie, which it almost nearly is. The villain has a sidekick (the chick with the explosive T&A) who exists only to sleep with nearly every male member of the cast, and coming close with a couple females too. Even our heroine, who is supposed to be one of the most brilliant clinical psychologists in her field (she uses classical music to break through to violent killers!) descends in to adult film territory when she illogically and instantly falls in love with Faust in one of the film's most ludicrous plot turns. She watches in horror as the demon kills two cops and then for no reason starts to make out with him as soon as he shows interest in her. She even proclaims how much she wanted him from the moment they met, which if you're keeping track, was when she visited him as a raving lunatic serial killer in a mental health facility. Lovely.

"Good heavens, I think I blew my face inside out!" (Anybody that gets this reference is entitled to one week as my best friend.)